“The Original” Bessie Brown: Song From a Cotton Field and St. Louis Blues

I don’t believe that Bessie Brown — who was billed as “The Original” Bessie Brown — was a major star. In a way, that makes the fact that we are listening to her at the end of 2012 — more than 80 years after she had a brief moments of fame — all the more amazing. The authenticity of Song from a Cotton Field, which is above — whether it was really a tenant farmer or sharecropper song — is an interesting question. The Internet Archive credits Brown as the composer, but it is possible that the core song was much older.

Of course, everything sounds a thousand years old. It is obvious, however, that the band backing her on that song and on Basin Street Blues, which is below, was hot.

Bessie Brown (Cleveland, Ohio 1895 – 1955), also known as “The Original” Bessie Brown, was a blues and classic jazz singer. She sometimes recorded under the pseudonyms of Sadie Green and Caroline Lee and should not be confused with her namesake, the Bessie Brown who recorded blues duets with George W. Williams. She was active as a recording artist from 1925 to 1928. She left showbusiness in 1932 and had three children before dying of a heart attack in 1955.

More on Brown–whose recording career only lasted from 1925 to 1928–at Red Hot Jazz, which is a great site dedicated to jazz before 1930.

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About The Daily Music Break

Today, everyone has their own channel. Somebody who is nuts for big band jazz can choose to listen to nothing but Woody Herman and Count Basie. Classic rock fans can avoid everything but Cream and Hendrix. Madrigals your thing? No problem…

That’s fine. To each his or her own. But there is a price: Listening to what we know we like keeps us from hearing what we know nothing about. In art, the unknown always is a great thing.